


Course and Flow, Surge and Break

by MadameFolie



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Body Image, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Masturbation, Nonnies Made Me Do It
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-14
Updated: 2017-03-14
Packaged: 2018-10-05 02:55:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 956
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10295843
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MadameFolie/pseuds/MadameFolie
Summary: Beauty and desire are a parallax, ever-shifting with the years and where one stands.Otabek would marvel at his hands. They used to be delicate, now they're elegant. Powerful. And his beauty now relentless. Otabek twists to bury his face in his pillow. But what pushes him over the edge in the end is the thought of those eyes, forged to unreal ferocity by time and all the lovelier still. He would like to be as water in Yuri's arms, shivering with the touches to his surface.





	

One, two, three, four – relevé. Six, seven, eight. And hold, two three, four– Lilia taps her cane against the floor like the ballet master in a painting Otabek once saw. The studio was bright and dusty, the dancers a dream in gossamer skirts. Yakov’s studio smells like cigarettes and floor wax. The older students say it helps if you score up the bottoms of your shoes so you don’t slip. Otabek wants to try, but he doesn’t have a knife. He breathes in for the hold, releases on the descent. And plié. Two, three, four–  
  
And despite the darkness, despite the smell, Yuri Plisetsky is captivating. He keeps time with Lilia’s beat like it’s the rhythm of his own heart and Otabek burns with envy. His poise is incredible. Otabek strains just to bring his leg above the barre for stretches. Hold, six, seven, eight. His reflection in the mirror sweats like a fairy tale beast. Porcine. Hideous.  
  
What he wouldn’t give, just to trade places. Release, two, three, four–  
  
  
The first time he and Yuri ever speak is at Pokal der Blauer Schwerten in Dresden. He’s taking a step back from the day’s warmup with a trip to the vending machines. One of which has decided to eat his bill and keep his peanuts, which jut from the dispenser coil in the eerie angle of a snapped limb. Kicking the machine isn’t an option, not as hard as he’ll need to. His wallet’s back in the locker room with his bag. Otabek’s beginning to wonder if maybe he should consider the nuts a loss and break for a proper lunch instead. Behind him, he can hear an impatient snort.  
  
“Pick something or fuck off,” Yuri sneers. He’s got his hood pulled up tight to his scalp, breathable polyester armor to bastion him against the world. “Some of us have shit to do.” His hair’s starting to grow out, sprouting out under his ears and brushing his jaw. It gives him a softer look. His eyes are still hard and determined. He tips his chin so he’s got Otabek in the corner of his eye rather than head-on in his view. This too is new. “….what? You got a problem?”  
  
Oh, Otabek thinks. He’s been staring. He taps a finger against the glass of the machine.  
  
“…..it’s stuck,” he tries to explain. In his mouth his tongue is heavy and he feels stupid next to Yuri’s sharp grace. It doesn’t surprise him that Yuri does not pay him that much mind after that.  
  
  
It must be nice to be so beautiful. Otabek has been told he’s good-looking and he supposes he doesn’t have any reason to doubt that. But for what he does his body’s all wrong. In the mirror, his own reflection looks awkward. He leans his weight forward and lifts a leg behind him. Height hasn’t caught up with breadth yet and there’s still time. He can’t keep depending on the possibility that it might. With practice it’s getting easier to balance, but it looks odd. Otabek strains to lengthen the spread of his limbs. More fluidity, more grace– he arches his toes. What else can he possibly do?  
  
When he practices the motions for his arms he tries to picture himself as water. He flows with the force of gravity, pushing his palm to the air before him like a river coursing through its bed. He curls around cataracts and bends – and here is the turn, the beginning of the step sequence – and surges against the banks. It’s too rough by far, he wills his muscle to obey and finds the splay of his fingers breaking upon the rocks. Damn it. Got all tense. Otabek makes a fist of each hand and and shakes the stress from them, breathes deeply of the studio dust and begins again.  
  
  
(Otabek does indeed get a little bit taller. It turns out he was right in the end, though.)  
  
(Likewise, Otabek and Yuri become friends. Because Otabek develops a taste for proving himself right.)  
  
  
The next time he sees Yuri Plisetsky, they’ve both grown again. Otabek’s face is rough in the mornings now, and rough in the evenings too on a bad day. And Yuri is taller. His voice is lower than Otabek remembers. His eyes are harder.  
  
Otabek jerks off in his hotel room that night. One day, Yuri could outstrip him entirely– not that he hasn’t already, but in other ways– he’d be long, and lean, graceful  in his body’s new fittings. Strong enough to wrest Otabek to his knees  on the mattress. He could hook his arms under Otabek’s and Otabek would  marvel at his hands. They used to be delicate, now they’re elegant.  Powerful. And his beauty now relentless. Otabek twists to bury his face  in his pillow. But what pushes him over the edge in the end is the  thought of those eyes, forged to unreal ferocity by time and all the  lovelier still.  
  
He would like to be as water in Yuri’s arms, shivering with the touches to his surface.  
  
  
“Hang on,” Yuri says, “I want a picture of this.” Were he not already red across the shoulders Otabek would have no recourse and so instead he looks at the line of Yuri’s back as he reaches for his phone. It seems unnecessary, but then, he’s become somewhat indulgent like that.  
  
Several minutes and several photos are required before Yuri is satisfied. Yuri sits back on his feet between Otabek’s legs to examine him through the window of his camera screen. His cock lies against the crook of Otabek’s groin, his hand capping Otabek’s knee and he breathes: “Fuck. Keep that pose a sec.”  
  
And Otabek holds– one, two, three, four–


End file.
